My Dumb Question of the Day


I feel strongly that I should ask a dumb question every day. Audiogon's turn.

When I am playing an LP I clearly hear the music when the amp is off. I know that this is how the phonograph has worked from the beginning (the old wind up Victrola at my sister's house), but is this really a good thing. Would better more efficient coupling improve the signal to the cartridge, would better damping of the tonearm improve the signal, basically, is this accoustic phenomena less noticable on a really high end turntable.

I'm using a Clearaudio Champion with Aurum Beta S and RB300 arm.
jpharris
Only an engineer could ask a question like that:)

It doesn't seem like such a dumb question to me. If you can hear the acoustic effects of the stylus tracking the groove then obviously some energy is being wasted that could have been transferred electrically. A more efficient transfer mechanism should, in theory, result in more information being retrieved from the groove.

Sorry, I don't know the answer, though.
I've got it! Let's burn little pits into the record and have a LASER read them. No mechanical coupling at all. This sould give us perfect sound forever. No, wait a minute, I think this has been tried and vinyl still sounds better. Go figure.